1. Aboard a Slave Ship, 1829 Interception at Sea
Conditions aboard the slave ships were wretched. Men, women and children crammed into every available space, denied
adequate room, food or breathing space. The stench was appalling - the atmosphere inhumane to say the least. The
Reverend Robert Walsh served aboard one of the ships assigned to intercept the slavers off the African coast. On the
morning of May 22, 1829, this is Reverend Walsh's account as he boards the slave ship:
"The first object that struck us was an enormous gun, turning on a swivel, on deck - the constant appendage of a pirate;
and the next were large kettles for cooking, on the bows - the usual apparatus of a slaver. Our boat was now hoisted out,
and I went on board with the officers. When we mounted her decks we found her full of slaves. She was called the Feloz,
commanded by Captain Jose' Barbosa, bound to Bahia (Brazil). She had taken in, on the coast of Africa, 336 males and
226 females, making in all 562, and had been out seventeen days, during which she had thrown overboard 55. The slaves
were all enclosed under grated hatchways between decks. The space was so low that they sat between each other's legs
and [were] stowed so close together that there was no possibility of their lying down or at all changing their position by
night or day.
As they belonged to and were shipped on account of different individuals, they were all branded like sheep with the
owner's marks of different forms. These were impressed under their breasts or on their arms, and, as the mate informed me
with perfect indifference 'burnt with the red-hot iron.' Over the hatchway stood a ferocious-looking fellow with a scourge
of many twisted thongs in his hand, who was the slave driver of the ship, and whenever he heard the slightest noise below,
he shook it over them and seemed eager to exercise it.
As soon as the poor creatures saw us looking down at them, their dark and melancholy visages (faces) brightened up.
They perceived something of sympathy and kindness in our looks which they had not been accustomed to, and, feeling
instinctively that we were friends, they immediately began to shout and clap their hands. One or two had picked up a few
Portuguese words, and cried out, "Viva! Viva!" The women were particularly excited. They all held up their arms, and
when we bent down and shook hands with them, they could not contain their delight; they endeavored to scramble up on
their knees, stretching up to kiss our hands, and we understood that they knew we were come to liberate them. Some,
however, hung down their heads in apparently hopeless dejection; some were greatly emaciated, and some, particularly
children, seemed dying.
But the circumstance which struck us most forcibly was how it was possible for such a number of human beings to exist,
packed up and wedged together as tight as they could cram, in low cells three feet high, the greater part of which, except
that immediately under the grated hatchways, was shut out from light or air, and this when the thermometer, exposed to
the open sky, was standing in the shade, on our deck, at 89'.
The heat of these horrid places was so great and the odor so offensive that it was quite impossible to enter them, even had
there been room. They were measured as above when the slaves had left them. The officers insisted that the poor suffering
creatures should be admitted on deck to get air and water. This was opposed by the mate of the slaver, who, from a feeling
that they deserved it, declared they would murder them all. The officers, however, persisted, and the poor beings were all
turned up together. It is impossible to conceive the effect of this eruption - 517 fellow creatures of all ages and sexes,
some children, some adults, some old men and women, all in a state of total nudity, scrambling out together to taste the
luxury of a little fresh air and water.
After enjoying for a short time the unusual luxury of air, some water was brought; it was then that the extent of their
sufferings was exposed in a fearful manner. They all rushed like maniacs towards it. No entreaties or threats or blows
could restrain them; they shrieked and struggled and fought with one another for a drop of this precious liquid, as if they
grew rabid at the sight of it.
It was not surprising that they should have endured much sickness and loss of life in their short passage. They had sailed
from the coast of Africa on the 7th of May and had been out but seventeen days, and they had thrown overboard no less

2. than fifty-five, who had died of dysentery and other complaints in that space of time, though they had left the coast in
good health. Indeed, many of the survivors were seen lying about the decks in the last stage of emaciation and in a state of
filth and misery not to be looked at. Even-handed justice had visited the effects of this unholy traffic on the crew who
were engaged in it. Eight or nine of the crew had died, and at that moment six were in hammocks on board, in different
stages of fever. This mortality did not arise from want of medicine. There was a large stock ostentatiously displayed in the
cabin, with a manuscript book containing directions as to the quantities; but the only medical man on board was a black,
who was as ignorant as his patients.
References:
Walsh, Robert, Notices of Brazil in 1828 and 1829 (1831).
How To Cite This Article:
"Aboard a Slave Ship, 1829," EyeWitness to History, www.eyewitnesstohistory.com (2000).